FY 2016 Grantees

Arts Learning

Project grants to provide opportunities for lifelong learners to acquire knowledge and understanding of and skills in the arts

Number of grants awarded on July 16, 2015 and November 4, 2015

60

Total dollars awarded July 16, 2015, and November 4, 2015

$ 2,699,195

Grantee, City

Grant Amount

20% Theatre Company, Minneapolis

$ 21,000

20% Theatre Company's apprentice program will hire and match ten emerging artist apprentices with professional mentors to work together on the world premiere of The Naked I: Right Now.

Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, Saint Paul

$ 131,943

Amherst H. Wilder Foundation will collaborate with multiple teaching artists to explore the theme of self-portraiture for older adults, adults with disabilities, and caregivers on aging and caregiving journeys.

Arrowhead Juvenile Center, Duluth

$ 17,800

Act U.P. In Class will offer Arrowhead Juvenile Center youth the opportunity to act with "unified purpose" to create performances exploring themes from academics which are relevant to their lives.

AuSM, Saint Paul

$ 43,068

Autism Society of Minnesota will partner with Z Puppets Rosenschnoz to expand sensory-friendly arts and mindfulness programming to the Twin Cities' eastern suburbs, with outreach to previously underserved families.

Jennifer Bowen Hicks, Saint Paul

$ 76,497

Accomplished writers and teaching artists will provide creative writing instruction to incarcerated Minnesotans. Authors will present to each class, a public reading of participants work will be hosted, and participants will compile a journal of their work.

Children's Museum of Southern Minnesota, Mankato

$ 19,500

Artists Megan F. Johnson and Dana Sikkila will lead a youth ensemble to create Made Garden—an art installation/performance at the Children's Museum of Southern Minnesota that stems from recycled materials and invites visitors into the creative process.

CHOICE, Unlimited, Duluth

$ 89,041

CHOICE, unlimited's ARTS program is dedicated to providing and expanding creative opportunities for individuals with disabilities in Minnesota to study, participate, and share their artwork with the community.

COMPAS artists will engage 1,400 students as they partner with classroom teachers in eight schools across Minnesota to integrate arts learning and creating into STEM (science, technology, engineering, or math) topics.

The Copper Street Brass Quintet, Minneapolis

$ 35,760

The Copper Street Brass Quintet will present its Chamber Music Skills Camp, building upon previous programming at four partner schools in Minneapolis, and providing an in-depth exploration of key musical skills alongside professional musicians, using chamber music as the medium.

Crossroads School and Vocational Center, Saint Francis

$ 9,700

Dunyia Drum and Dance will conduct residencies and student performances on West African drumming and dance at Crossroads School in Saint Francis.

Susan E. Feigenbaum, Eden Prairie

$ 12,900

Susan Feigenbaum will teach clay classes at five senior communities. Independent, assisted, and memory care residents will learn art concepts, artmaking skills, engage socially, and share their learning at art exhibits open to the public.

Folwell Performing Arts Magnet, Minneapolis

$ 20,685

Folwell School third through sixth grade students will learn and perform cultural dance through multiple Curio Dance residencies. Workshops will culminate in student and artist performances and community events.

Franconia Sculpture Park, Shafer

$ 31,185

Franconia Sculpture Park will provide arts learning programming for rural Minnesota youth through its Rural Arts workshops that include customized guided tours and artmaking activities developed and led by professional teaching artists.

Frank Theatre, Minneapolis

$ 39,500

Frank Theatre will conduct a three-part residency at MERC Alternative High School that will employ storytelling, theater games, writing games, and culminate in a public performance created by the students.

Free Arts Minnesota, Minneapolis

$ 25,949

Free Arts Minnesota will partner with Rogue Citizen and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts on Markings: High Art, Low Tech, a sustainable and accessible arts learning program for 100 at-risk Twin Cities youth.

Christopher E. Griffith, Minneapolis

$ 65,517

Z Puppets Rosenschnoz will expand a partnership with Epic Enterprise to lead adults with special needs in eight arts and mindfulness workshops and four public performances of the puppet, rock, and yoga adventure, Monkey Mind Pirates.

Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis

$ 58,400

The Guthrie Theater will deepen its engagement with ninth grade students at Roosevelt and North High Schools by providing a dedicated teaching artist in residence for each site to serve as an arts learning resource for a full academic year.

Harambee Elementary School, Maplewood

$ 31,495

COMPAS teaching artists will conduct visual arts and theater residencies with students at Harambee Elementary. The project will connect multiple subject areas around the theme of water.

Hillcrest Community School, Bloomington

$ 48,006

Hillcrest Community School, an Artful Learning school, and COMPAS will deepen the Artful Learning model through artist residencies in grades pre-kindergarten to grade five to expand learners' engagement with authentic arts experiences.

History Theatre, Saint Paul

$ 34,150

History Theatre will offer residencies for underserved youth and older adults, guided by professional teaching artists, to create works based on participants' own lived experiences and stories.

Illusion Theater will partner with two middle schools in the Twin Cities and two high schools in Blue Earth and Duluth to provide arts learning experiences through theater arts that are inspired by and relevant to the lives of the students.

In Progress, Saint Paul

$ 49,500

NEXUS is dedicated to increasing the professional expertise and viability of emerging media artists from underserved communities. The program includes skill training, mentorship, critique, presentation, and networking.

Interact, Minneapolis

$ 68,070

One Heart/Many Voices will engage students at Mississippi Creative Arts Elementary in the creation of poetry, music, puppets, and theater. The project is led by eight Interact teaching artists and seven coteaching artists with disabilities, over three weeks and culminates in a final performance celebration.

Intermedia Arts, Minneapolis

$ 35,812

GenArt will bring seventy-two teens and elders from Little Earth of United Tribes together in the creation of photographic, written, visual, and musical art led by six teaching artists and inspired by conversations about identity, time, and memory.

Intermediate School District 287, Plymouth

$ 35,460

The hip-hop arts residency will engage elementary students with disabilities from District 287 to create and perform using spoken word, music creation, dance, and visual arts elements of hip-hop with COMPAS teaching artists.

Katha Dance Theatre, Crystal

$ 26,800

Katha Dance Theatre will conduct fifty-five hours of Kathak dance and folk arts of India workshops for 30 high school students and 30 senior participants in the Twin Cities. The workshops will culminate in Katha Dance Theatre's 2015 fall concert which will include student participation.

Chris Koza, Minneapolis

$ 20,520

Singer/songwriter Chris Koza will engage Washburn High School in an extended residency that will culminate in performances of original student musical compositions.

The Loft Literary Center, Minneapolis

$ 25,065

The Loft Literary Center will provide a new series of creative writing educational sessions for writers of color and those who are writing about race, taught by award-winning Minnesota author and educator David Mura.

Lyndale Neighborhood Association, Minneapolis

$ 60,750

Lyndale neighborhood community will come together to design and create a large outdoor mural on the playground wall of Lyndale Community School, under the artistic direction of muralist Greta McLain.

Lyric Arts Main Street Stage, Anoka

$ 24,085

Lyric Arts Main Street Stage will establish Praxis, a student company for ages fourteen to twenty-one, that provides mentorship and training in theatrical production including performance, design, promotion, and management.

City of Maplewood, Maplewood

$ 98,874

The City of Maplewood will work with Z Puppets Rosenschnoz to launch Kid City, creative task forces of ten- to twelve-year-olds that will learn how to use clowning, puppetry, and improvisation to bring diverse cultural communities together.

Midwest Special Services, Inc., Saint Paul

$ 29,170

Midwest Special Services participants will explore the world of puppetry with Z Puppets Rosenschnoz. The program will conclude with three live multimedia puppet shows.

Minneapolis Pathways, Minneapolis

$ 5,478

Pathways and the Minneapolis Institute of Art will collaborate to provide low-income individuals in health crisis that have limited access to the arts, with a learning, therapeutic mindfulness-based arts experience.

Minneapolis Pops Orchestra Association, Minneapolis

$ 10,453

Kids Play, offered in collaboration with several public school instrumental music programs, provides students with mentors through sectional coaching and side-by-side performance experiences with Minneapolis Pops Orchestra professional musicians.

Minnesota Center for Book Arts, Minneapolis

$ 29,750

Minnesota Center for Book Arts' On The Road program will partner with seven regional arts centers in the seven-county metro area to provide new book arts programming to Minnesota learners in their home communities.

Minnesota Children's Museum, Saint Paul

$ 33,859

Minnesota Children's Museum's teaching artist series engages children with Minnesota artists, in a guided arts learning experience through workshops and drop-in activities in which they will create or respond to art.

Minnesota Masonic Home, Bloomington

$ 11,504

The Minnesota Masonic Home will work with COMPAS to provide its residents with opportunities to create and exhibit art, along with experiencing the art of others through related outings and art exhibitions.

North House Folk School will host Fresh Cut Wood Turning Symposium, a celebration of the traditional and contemporary ingenuity of green wood turning and the community of artists who preserve and evolve the art form.

Northern Clay Center, Minneapolis

$ 63,449

Northern Clay Center will collaborate with community organizations that serve older adults through educational clay programs tailored to serve those in skilled nursing care, independent living co-ops, clinical settings, and day programs.

Open World Learning Community, Saint Paul

$ 16,850

In the Heart of the Beart Puppet and Mask Theatre will collaborate with Open World Learning Spanish language classes to research write, design, build, and perform a bilingual puppet show based on the book Cajas de Carton, exploring the immigrant experience.

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts

$ 60,590

The Ordway will conduct Cultural Moves, dance residencies with three teaching artists that will connect learning to artistic and cultural content in shows by three dance companies and a performance that features teaching artists' original choreography.

Penumbra Theatre Company, Inc., Saint Paul

$ 44,110

Penumbra Theatre will diversify the theatre program at South High School by providing a theater residency serving students identified by South High School as unable to participate due to the inaccessibility of afterschool programming.

Pillsbury House Theatre, Minneapolis

$ 70,000

Pillsbury House Theatre teaching artists will work with human service programs and senior living facilities to provide arts learning experiences connecting young people with elders in neighborhoods facing multiple barriers to participation.

Saint Louis County School District, Virginia

$ 65,614

South Ridge School will partner with Frank Theatre in arts residencies to help students build confidence in their own voice telling their stories, and increase their writing/reading skills through writing exercises, storytelling, and theater games.

Saint Paul Music Academy, Saint Paul

$ 26,200

Building STE(A)M Through the Arts is a STEM-based project with arts at the core. Grade five students in three Saint Paul public schools explore the physics of tops and create original music, art, and dances based on tops, showcased at a public event.

Luverne G. Seifert, Saint Anthony

$ 73,167

Luverne Seifert and four performing and teaching artists will provide theater workshops to five greater Minnesota communities. The residencies will culminate in a coproduction of Urinetown to bring attention to the water challenges facing Minnesota.

She Rock She Rock, Minneapolis

$ 22,000

She Rock She Rock will present Girls Rock n Roll Retreat, a music summer camp for adolescent girls. Participants will take instrument instruction, form a band, write original songs, and perform a live rock show.

Stages Theatre Company, Hopkins

$ 56,460

Stages Theatre Company will work with six Minnesota middle and junior high schools to offer Perspectives, an arts residency program for students and teachers that results in a collaborative performance on the subject of peace.

SteppingStone Theatre, Saint Paul

$ 40,700

SteppingStone Theatre will collaborate with Carin Bratlie, Pedro Bayon, and Terrel Woods to work with second grade students in a create-a-play residency exploring equity, cultural pedagogy, and alternate learning styles.

Kevin Strauss, Rochester

$ 24,996

The Community Writing Workshop Project gives adult and older adult Minnesotans in six underserved outstate communities the skills, practice, feedback, and experience to write and publish engaging stories and poetry.

Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater, Minneapolis

$ 47,200

Stuart Pimsler Dance and Theater will engage schools in two Minnesota communities, Rochester and Detroit Lakes, through two-week Family Albums/Snapshot residencies culminating in performances created by the students.

Upstream Arts, Inc., Minneapolis

$ 87,637

Upstream Arts will carry out residency programs in the special education classrooms of 25 Minneapolis public schools in the 2015-16 school year. This program will bring theater, music, dance, visual arts, and poetry to 375 students with disabilities.

Urban Arts Academy, Minneapolis

$ 48,217

Urban Arts Academy will partner with COMPAS to offer an "Exploring Identity and Culture through Art" initiative for 100 diverse, low-income youth and their families, including residencies, educational performances, and cultural diversity staff training.

Carrie Vecchione, Apple Valley

$ 24,986

Carrie Vecchione and Rolf Erdahl will present a series of music education programs, once a month for seven months, in ten senior residences in various Minnesota cities for a total of seventy presentations to Minnesota seniors.

Women's Writing Program of Advisory Task Force on the Women and Juvenile Female Offender in Corrections, Elk River

$ 6,940

Women's Writing Program will engage short-term incarcerated women with published writers to learn creative writing skills for self-expression and building self-esteem and will publish poetry chapbooks for public libraries.

Zenon Dance Company and School, Inc., Minneapolis

$ 72,855

Zenon Dance proposes five weeks of residency programs at schools in greater Minnesota, bringing dance education and performance to students who are underserved by this art form.